Community Post #24 - Zeph Edition (Aww yeah)

Man, where do I begin on this thing? I honestly don't really know, I guess, it's a lot to take in when you think about it.

I mean, let's take a look back at what's gone on recently, shall we?

First you have Foxy and Flash's resignation. Now, we all know about this, but I feel the need to go a little bit more in depth with this sort of thing because it implies a bit of change among the staff ranks, in a more structural sense, not the more obvious "people have left" sense. You see, Foxy was the head Admin, and Flash was the head of the Radio, so where does that leave us?

Well honestly, it doesn't leave us in a good position. To be frank, the site's gone downhill every time the head admin has stepped down and this makes, what, the third one to do so? It's getting a bit old. So naturally, we decided to tinker around with how things are run at the top of the totem pole. Who is the next head admin? Nobody, simply put, but naturally, you all already know this so I'll only speak bluntly for reminder's sake. The staff is now run by an Oligarchy of Berry, Mike, and Myself. Berry keeps an eye on the Radio now in place of Flash, Mike sees over the technical side of the site in place of Grey, and I see over the Forums now in place of Foxy. The three of us work in a trifecta where nobody is higher than the other for simplicity's sake.

Also it's kind of stressful being an admin, let alone being the head-admin, so there's that too, yeah.

What was next on that list? Oh right, more staff leavings. As you all know, Poetic's left as well. Now as for why he did this, he's given me his permission as to why so now we all get to know. Let's take a look why don't we?

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"1- *Lack of co-operation because several staff members were unwilling to listen to each other to the extent where nothing ever got done.

2- Too many staff which resulted in an uneven balance, made the staff look more like a VIP club than moderators and led to bigger arguments.

3. The job wasn't fun any more, too many people started treating it way too seriously (as in hardcore) than it needed to be. I care about the site but Jesus, some people needed to chill once in a while.

4. Moderators belittling users behind their backs and treating everyone as guilty until proven innocent. Also it appeared mods thought the more bans, edits and thread moves you do, the better job you're doing, and that being a moderator makes you a better person than the members.

5. I didn't feel like part of a team, I was constantly ignored, had to appeal to admins if I wanted to express any ideas seriously, and was treated differently because I was just a CO which apparently means jack **** from the looks, things were more productive back in like, April."
~Poetic '2012
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So yeah, there's those. I'd normally say "Don't worry, we're working on fixing these things", which we are, but this sort of thing takes time. It's changed a bit since his resignation but I can still assure you the job still isn't all that fun, haha.

With these changes in staff, we've decided to revamp the entire staff structuring as well to make things easier for everyone to understand, because let's face it, half of the people on here couldn't tell us the difference between a forum moderator and a community patrol member, could you? So to simplify things, we've combined the two roles making them one and the same as well as condensing roles such as blog moderators, RP moderators, and fanfic moderators in the section of Section Moderators. There's a bit more of an analysis on these changes found in the "Meet the Staff" section found in this thread.

Anyways, what else was there. Oh of course, the site was attacked just recently wasn't it? Well, I honestly wouldn't say attacked would be the correct word. Harassed fits the circumstance quite well, though I think I should shed a little bit more light on what happened yesterday night.

It all began around... 9 PM Eastern? Something like that. Anyway, around that time I received a PM on Skype from Saikyo, otherwise known as Ramza on here, regarding a snippet from the Admin room. Now for those of you who don't know, there's been some leaks from the staff room these past couple of weeks and when I saw that there had been one from the Admin room of all places, simply put, I flipped my lid. To keep things short, it was revealed to us through FULL CAPS SKYPE MESSAGES from the man himself that he had cracked into Foxy's skype account and was planning on using the information he had to go after others as well. You all already know how this tale ends, and again to keep things short we all had to play a sadistic game of 20 questions before greyOne confessed to the misdeed and he was banned from the site on the spot.


Alrighty, with all the dreadful stuff out of the way, I can move on to the funner things.*

Ah right, be sure to check out Snow's thread on the State of EP. It's sparked quite a good bit of a constructive discussion on the state of the site at this point and would you look at that, users and staff collaborating together in harmony. What a beautiful thing, wouldn't you agree?

On that very same topic, in that thread you can see the gears in my brain constructing a bit of an idea I've had for a while involving something along the lines of a "Site Meeting", well, I figure there's no point in simply messing around with the idea but to execute it instead and see how this sort of thing goes, y'know?

The very first EP Site Meeting will be held this Monday on November 12th at 12PM Eastern Standard Time. That's 5PM for you Brits. I'll be there hosting it, and moderating the discussion itself for as long as it takes place. Keep in mind that since this sort of thing needs the it utmost control from everybody, there will be absolutely no arguing, or rule breaking in the slightest while we're all there. The same rules will apply as the debate section for the most part to ensure this.

If this all goes over well, then we can continue this sort of thing in the future, if not, site discussion will be limited to the section that shares its name.


As a reminder, the Applications for the Secret Santa Redux are due on the 7th of this month, which is in two days. If you wish to participate, please send those in. Likewise, of you don't think you can participate, please notify me so some poor pony doesn't go wanting this Christmas. I'll have to make a commercial for it even with some foal sitting behind me in the dirt as I look into the camera and ask for donations.

And yes, there will be sad music. Just like those animal cruelty commercials.
Only worse.

Wait, Testyal's immune to this sort of thing isn't he?
Damn.

Oh and one final thing, with the sudden leaving of about... What, 3 or 4 staff members and the removal of 2 or 3, there's a really empty space in my heart the staff ranks, and while indeed there used to be too many, now we have too little. So yes, we are looking for new staff members. No, this doesn't mean suddenly send in a million applications, it just means don't act surprised when we make the announcement as we've already just about decided who we want by this point.


And that's all for this week. Yeti will be taking over from now as as the head of the Community Moderation in the forums, specified by Foxy in the previous Community Post. I'm just taking over while he's away.

This is your Forum/Community Admin, Zephyr, signing off for the week.*


~Z

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Quick note:

In addition to the merger of Community Patrol and Global Forum Mods, colors will be given to the main staff ranks for quick identification (for example when looking at the list of online members at the bottom of the forum home).

As it stands the colors will be:
- Admins: Red
- Community Moderators: Yellow/gold
- Blog Moderators and RP Moderators: Purple
- Radio DJs: Blue

If any of these change we will let you know in next week's post, or earlier if necessary.

- Mike


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Also, don't forget on Band of Bronies show on Everypony Radio, every Saturday, 11am EST.

~Yetione